Hey there, Matt here from MessageUp!
It can be infuriating to find yourself trapped in a poorly designed process. Whether it’s a website process that leads you on a wild goose chase or a circuitous series of menus in a voicemail tree, we’ve all been there. And then there are the multi-step processes that must be diligently followed to get seemingly trivial tasks done, especially when large bureaucracies are involved (q.v., healthcare, insurance, and business expense claims).
Such experiences lead many of us to develop a life-long allergy to new processes. We’ve seen the harm they can do, so we resist them for all we’re worth. Which can become a problem when the process is actually necessary.
In this week’s post for The Framework blog, I address the question: Do I need to follow a process to succeed at B2B content marketing? In short, yes. Content marketing has become mission critical for B2B companies that want to grow, so having a content marketing process is correspondingly vital. Read the full post for a more detailed discussion and some tips on developing and implementing an effective B2B content marketing process.
Elsewhere on the web, we’ve found some pieces we think you’ll find interesting. Scroll down to What We’ve Been Reading to find summaries and URLs for articles about reaching a complex buying committee, TikTok for B2B businesses, real-world applications of context marketing, and changing fonts to make memos and web pages easier for some people to read.
The story about font choices, which refers to recent changes made by the US Department of State, is particularly interesting and should be relevant to anyone hoping to make their marketing more accessible and inclusive.
For this week’s One Step actionable tip, I’ve proposed four questions to ask yourself—or your team—about your company’s content production process. The answers will be qualitative but should nevertheless be instructive and help you identify areas for improvement.
Join me back here next Wednesday when I’ll be sharing some thoughts (from atop my soapbox) on content marketing “hacks”—the raft of “get rich quick” and “jam your calendar with appointments” schemes that sound too good to be true.
Until then, have a safe, hard-working, and productive week.
Cheers,
~ Matt
o/b/o Team MessageUp
Subscribe Today and Recommend Us To Your Network
Want to accept the inevitability of our latest updates hitting your inbox every Wednesday morning? Subscribe for free today!
Then, take thirty seconds and share the love with a deserving member of your network. Send them our Substack link (messageup.substack.com) so that they can sign up, too.
Our Latest Posts on The Framework Blog
Feb 08, 2023 - Do I need to follow a process to succeed at B2B content marketing?
Feb 01, 2023 - B2B Content Marketing is a Team Sport. Learn to Lead Accordingly
What We’ve Been Reading
Here are some articles we’ve been reading this week that you might enjoy and find helpful:
Stop Pitching to the C-Suite – How B2B Businesses Can Reach the Complex Buying Committee
Will Brooks, CEO of Raconteur, and guest writing for Business Leader, highlights the importance of targeting a range of departments within a business because new research shows that more than half of all B2B buying decisions involve 11 people or more. Strategic content marketing becomes ever more important...
TikTok for B2B Businesses: Is It Worth It?
The answers to this question will continue evolving as the B2B sector experiments with TikTok and finds clever ways to harness the platform (assuming it doesn't get banned any more widely). Megan Thudium, founder of content agency, MTC, assembled this informative piece for Entreprenuer.com's Leadership Network.
If Content Is King, Context Is Queen in Marketing
You can't just create content and expect it to do something for your brand. For content to work, you need a distribution plan. So says Amanda Ciarci in this neatly organized Brafton article focused on real-world applications of context marketing.
Changing Fonts Can Make Reading Easier for Some, Even in State Department Memos
Breaking News! Just kidding … but this is about as close as you'll get to seeing content marketing make the national headlines. The State Department (of all places) has decided to ditch Times New Roman, it's preferred font since 2004, in favor of Calibri to help make its webpages and publications more accessible. Jen Christensen, writing for CNN, explores what makes some typefaces more legible than others, especially for those with reading difficulties.
One Step…
Building on this week’s discussion about the need for a content production process, here are four questions you can ask yourself—or your team—to assess how things are working in your neck of the woods.
These questions are quite subjective, so you’ll be getting a qualitative feel for things, not a quantitative measure of process fit. Nevertheless, the answers should help you identify areas for improvement.
Four questions to ask about your content production process:
To what extent do we have a clearly documented editorial process that guides our team through developing content for publication in a timely manner?
How often do we end up scrambling to get content ready in time to meet a publication deadline, or decide that a deadline is unachievable?
How consistently do we publish high-quality content that’s relevant to our target audience?
Does our content strategy give us a competitive advantage or leave us at a competitive disadvantage?
Each of the four questions can spawn any number of “but why?” and “so what?” discussions, which is great. Follow them and see where they lead. The better you understand the company’s current process and how well it is working (or not), the easier it will be to find and implement workable improvements.
Until Next Time
We greatly appreciate your support.
Let us know in the comments how we’re doing and be sure to subscribe so that you don’t miss any of our future publications…